Last Confession of Rick O'Shea

by Clyde Barker

  Although Sheriff Jackson had removed his badge he was well enough known to one or two people in Archangel, who had made sure to spread the word to all the town that they were being favoured with a visit by the law. So it was that when Jackson and O’Shea fetched up at the ferry that afternoon, the owner regretfully informed them that he was unable to oblige because he was that day undertaking vital repairs to the raft.

  ‘Don’t jerk me around,’ said Sheriff Jackson irritably when told this. ‘I saw you taking three men over earlier this very day. What do you mean by it?’

  The man shrugged apologetically.

  ‘Cable’s fouled. It ain’t my fault. Not apt to be fixed for at least a week. I’m sorry an’ all, but there it is.’

  O’Shea watched this exchange and observed the sheriff’s rising anger with amusement. He understood just as well as Sheriff Jackson what was behind this little piece of play-acting: namely that the ferryman knew that when a sheriff required some service the money would be coming not from his private resources, but would rather be drawn from the public purse. That being so it was surely worth doubling or even trebling what he would have charged a private individual for a similar trip.

  There was something delightfully entertaining about the situation, not least for various loafers who were hanging around the landing stage with nothing better to do than watch a much-loathed lawman having his tail twisted and being in no position to do a damned thing about it. Jackson could hardly announce officially that he was the sheriff of Pecos County and was about to enter a neighbouring country where he had no business operating. This was meant to be a clandestine mission and the longer he delayed here the more chance there was of people asking what he was up to.

  In the end, he offered three times as much as the journey was worth, which had the immediate effect of freeing up the ‘fouled cable’ and allowing the trip to begin.

  There had been some debate before setting off for the ferry as to whether Jackson and O’Shea should take their horses with them or leave them in Archangel. If the distance to Chuchuverical had been greater O’Shea would have been all for ensuring that they had the means to travel fast but, as he set out the matter to Jackson, the village was only a mile or two from the river and they could walk it in under an hour. Since their own hope of success lay in concealment, walking quietly through the rocky landscape that surrounded the village would perhaps offer more hope for their purposes than thundering towards their target on horseback. When all was said and done, their best chance lay in secrecy rather than in force of arms.

  Once they had been landed on the Mexican shore the two men set off at a tangent, heading south-east rather than directly south towards Chuchuverical. There were other Anglos about, so they did not really stick out to any great degree. As they strolled in this circuitous route towards Chuchuverical, O’Shea remarked:

  ‘Who would have imagine you and me, Sheriff, making common cause in this way?’

  ‘I ain’t making common cause with you. Don’t think it for a moment. I got no interest in you, O’Shea, other than how useful you can be to me.’

  ‘You’re a hard man to like, you know that?’

  ‘I don’t want that you should like me. I’d say I’d gone down the wrong road somewhere were I to find that a thief like you was to get to liking me.’

  ‘Well, have it so. I was only after making conversation.’

  ‘Well, don’t. I don’t like you, O’Shea, and the good Lord help you if ever I find that you been leading me out here on a snipe hunt.’

  ‘Why would I be doing such a thing as that?’

  ‘I couldn’t say,’ said Sheriff Jackson. ‘I wouldn’t put anything past you.’

  They walked on in uncomfortable silence for another half-mile, then O’Shea said:

  ‘You know about this compound of Yanez’s that I heard about?’

  ‘I heard tell of it.’

  ‘You ever been there?’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  Rick O’Shea glanced sideways at the sheriff, puzzled.

  ‘I got the impression from what you said that you’d been over this way before,’ he said. ‘Just wondered if you’d had reason to pass this village and maybe knew aught about Yanez’s hideout. Nothing more.’

  ‘Oh, I see what you mean. Yeah, I seen it from a distance.’

  O’Shea’s face took on a slightly puzzled look.

  ‘What did you think I meant?’ he asked.

  ‘Happen I told you before, O’Shea, I ain’t wishing to chat with you like you’re some old friend that I was at school with. Let’s you and me just get on with the job in hand and not pretend that we like each other overmuch.’

  Their path led them up on to the slopes of a steep hill, which overlooked the village of Chuchuverical. The ground was covered in scree with many large boulders and rocks lying on the loose stones and drifts of grit. This meant that they had no difficulty in approaching the village without being seen. Unless somebody in the village were to be training a pair of field glasses straight in their direction, the odds were a hundred to one against anybody down below seeing the two figures as they picked their way across the dusty incline.

  ‘Let’s halt awhiles and see what’s to do next,’ Sheriff Jackson suggested.

  When they were sitting among the rocks, partially obscured from view of anybody in the village beneath them, Jackson pointed a finger:

  ‘See over yonder? Those white walls, a bit beyond the other buildings? That’s Yanez’s compound. I’d guess that that’s where he’s holding the child.’

  O’Shea studied the place for a spell.

  ‘If those walls are just adobe,’ he said, ‘then cracking ’em open with a couple o’ pounds of fine-grain powder would be the easiest thing in the world. Howsoever, easily in, but not so easily out again, as the lobster said when it found its way into the pot. It’s not just Yanez’s men as’d be after us. I’ve a notion that every man in that village would turn out to catch the Anglos and show ’em whose country they’re in.’

  ‘Trust an Irishman to think of blowing something up. Your Fenian tricks won’t serve here, O’Shea. We’ll be needing a little subtlety.’

  ‘And if it’s subtlety you’re wanting, you can’t do better than go to Seth Jackson’s shop, is that the way of it? Well, what do ye recommend?’

  ‘For now,’ Jackson replied, ‘I recommend that we settle down here and have us a little siesta, until dusk. Then you’ll see what I have in mind.’

  ‘Why the blazes did we cross over so early,’ asked O’Shea with some asperity, ‘if we’re going to waste our time now just sitting and doing nothing? We could have done nothing in Archangel for a few hours.’

  ‘Listen, I can get us in there, where Yanez is based. What’s more, I’ve a shrewd idea that I know where in the place he’s holding that poor child.’

  ‘The hell you do!’ exclaimed Rick O’Shea in astonishment. ‘Why didn’t you say so before?’

  ‘You ever ask yourself why the Lord gave us one mouth and two ears? So as we can listen twice as much as we speak. Never you mind what I know and what I don’t know. The two of us together’ll get that child back. Trust me.’

  If his life had taught Rick O’Shea anything at all, then two lessons about human nature stood out clearly in his mind. The first was that when a man says: It’s not what it looks like it invariably is. The other was that whenever anybody says: Trust me, then that is the last thing on God’s Earth that you should be doing. He didn’t say any of this to Sheriff Jackson, but simply shrugged and settled back with his hat over his face to see what would happen next.

  After having his sleep disturbed the night before and being awake since about three in the morning, O’Shea found it even easier than usual to be able to fall instantly asleep. When he was woken by Sheriff Jackson with a sharp prod in his ribs from the sheriff’s boot it was dark and the silver sliver of a nearly new moon, no thicker than a nail-paring, hung in the night sky.

  ‘
Get up, you lazy Irisher. You been slumbering like a hog. We got work to do.’

  It had not escaped O’Shea’s notice that ever since they had arrived on the Mexican side of the border Jackson had taken to acting as though he were in command and this whole thing were his very own show. This was a little strange, since as far as O’Shea understood the matter the whole scheme of coming across here to snatch back the child had been his idea entirely. He mentioned nothing of these doubts.

  ‘Well, what’s to do?’ he asked, sitting up.

  ‘We’re going over to that compound, that’s what to do. We’ll carry on walking the long way round, staying in the shadows so that we’re not marked. Once we get within striking distance I’ll tell you what my plan is.’

  ‘Could you not be telling me now?’

  ‘No,’ said Sheriff Jackson in a voice that did not invite further discussion.

  The two men walked along without talking, making their way to the wall of Yanez’s compound that faced away from the village of Chuchuverical. There did not appear to be anybody about, although judging by the height of the moon in the sky it was still early evening. When they reached the lime-washed adobe wall, which was perhaps ten feet high, Sheriff Jackson spoke to O’Shea in a soft voice:

  ‘Go feel the wall there; you see where that crack is?’

  Hugely puzzled, Rick O’Shea walked forward a few paces and reached out his hand to touch the wall. It felt slightly rough, but there was nothing out of the ordinary about it that he could make out. While he was doing this, Sheriff Jackson stepped forward and, while removing O’Shea’s pistol from its holster, drew his own and pointed it at the other man’s back.

  ‘You really are one stupid son of a bitch,’ he said. ‘You know that?’

  O’Shea turned round. Seeing that he had a gun pointing at him he immediately reached down for his own weapon, knowing as he did so that it was probably not going to be there. The sheriff gave a piercing series of whistles, presumably a code or password of some kind. Then he spoke to O’Shea.

  ‘Come on you, round to the front door. I know Yanez will be glad to see you. How he’ll laugh when I tell him the story of how you thought that you were persuading me to come here.’

  Feeling like the biggest fool since the world’s creation, O’Shea walked ahead of Sheriff Jackson round to the front of the little fortlike construction. The main gate was open. Standing there, illuminated by the light of two blazing pine knots held by the men who accompanied him, his face split with a broad smile, was the man who, O’Shea figured, could only be Valentin Yanez.

  ‘Jackson, my friend,’ said Yanez, ‘it surely is good to see you again. And what’s this? You’ve brought me a present?’

  ‘Let me introduce the famous Rick O’Shea,’ announced Jackson mockingly. ‘The man who’s going to provide the finishing touch to all our plans.’

  Chapter 4

  Wondering how he could have been so careless in overlooking so many clues as to the true nature of the enterprise in which he had been engaged, Rick O’Shea found himself being prodded forward at gunpoint and compelled to enter Yanez’s compound. Once they were all within the courtyard the gate was closed and barred. O’Shea stopped dead and turned to face Jackson.

  ‘You’re a damned villain,’ he said, ‘worse than any bandit I ever heard tell of.’

  By way of answer Sheriff Jackson swung the pistol in his hand across O’Shea’s face, splitting his lips, loosening a couple of teeth and sending him sprawling to the ground.

  ‘Any more such words from you,’ said Jackson quietly, ‘I’ll kill you straight off and to hell with the consequences.’

  O’Shea had no reason at all to believe that the sheriff was speaking anything other than the literal truth. He accordingly remained silent and waited to see what would develop. It was Yanez who broke the tension between the two of them.

  ‘Ah, you cannot let this man go to his death without knowing why he must die,’ he remarked. ‘That would be too cruel, even by my standards.’

  Jackson shrugged and scowled, but the Mexican did not take the hint. He continued:

  ‘I don’t know how the good sheriff here managed to lure you to my home—’

  At this point Sheriff Jackson burst into laughter.

  ‘Lure him?’ he said. ‘The boot’s on the other foot entirely. It was him who was so all-fired up to come and visit you, Yanez. I only obliged him by showing him the way. It was all his doing.’

  By the light of the pine torches O’Shea was able to study Yanez’s face and found that it was a deal more pleasing than that of the crooked sheriff. There was, it was true, cruelty and animal passion, but these traits were mingled with good humour and intelligence. It was by no means an unlikable countenance. Yanez looked down at where O’Shea was lying, then unexpectedly bent down and stretched out his hand to help him to his feet.

  ‘Your sheriff,’ explained Yanez, once Rick O’Shea was standing again, ‘is my friend. We work together. He helps me and I help him. We have a saying in Spanish which translates as “One hand washes the other”. When my friend became aware that he might not be re-elected, there was consternation. Not only for him, but for me too. Imagine! What would happen if I found myself dealing with an honest sheriff on the other side of the Rio? No, it would never do.

  ‘So we hatch a plan, he and I. One which keeps him in his job, which is to my advantage and also pays me – how much was it again?’ he turned to Sheriff Jackson.

  ‘Five thousand dollars.’

  ‘Five thousand?’ asked O’Shea. ‘The figure I heard was ten.’

  Yanez smile widened even further.

  ‘Ten was what your sheriff told me to put in the ransom note,’ he said, ‘but we neither of us expected to get that.’

  ‘For all that Tom dresses up fine for church on Sundays,’ Jackson said, ‘those Covenays are poor as they come. Putting on airs and graces when he’s no wealthier than me. I think I see us getting ten thousand dollars out of that family.’

  That both Sheriff Jackson and the Mexican were being so forthcoming about their innermost secrets was not encouraging. O’Shea simply couldn’t see how Jackson could possibly allow him to live after what he had been privy to this evening.

  ‘Where do I fit in to all this?’ he asked.

  ‘Well now,’ said Yanez affably, ‘I was surprised when the sheriff arrived with you, but I see at once what he is about. You are to be our . .. how do you call it in English? Ah yes – the “fall- guy”.’ He turned to Jackson. ‘Am I right? Is that both the correct expression and tells me what brings you here with this fellow?’

  ‘Both right.’

  Yanez turned courteously back to Rick O’Shea.

  ‘You see,’ he continued, ‘having abstracted this child from her home and secreted her here in my own country, we both needed to turn a profit on the business – and also benefit my friend here: to make sure that he was confirmed as sheriff for at least another year. A newspaper with connections back East has offered a reward of no less than five thousand dollars for the safe return of the little girl, coupled with the arrest of the perpetrator.’

  In spite of his detestation of this type of crime, O’Shea couldn’t help feeling a slight admiration for such a neatly contructed plot.

  ‘I wonder that the paper didn’t just offer to pay the ransom for the child straight to the men who stole her away,’ he said.

  ‘Wouldn’t be legal,’ said Sheriff Jackson at once. ‘That’d be what we call compounding a felony.’

  ‘And so,’ Yanez said, wrapping it up, ‘our friend Jackson will bring the rescued child back to San Angelo and confirm that one of my men was instrumental in solving the case. He will then be able to collect the reward money. Unless I am greatly mistaken, you will play the part of the bandit himself. Killed, I am guessing, while resisting lawful arrest. Am I right?’ He turned again to Jackson, who nodded.

  ‘The citizens,’ Yanez went on, ‘will be so impressed by their sheriff’s courage and ten
acity that they will wish to keep him, in addition to which he gains a thousand dollars. I and my men will have four thousand and everybody will be happy. It is a sound plan, no?’

  ‘The only loser seems likely to be me,’ observed O’Shea. ‘From what I can make out, I am apt to be killed before this little comedy reaches its end.’

  ‘That is so,’ said Yanez regretfully. ‘But such are the fortunes of life. We will at least feed you well during your stay here.’

  ‘Yes,’ Jackson put in, ‘I want him alive at least ’til we cross the river again. It’ll be no good me carting back some stinking corpse and trying to make out I just shot him. I’ll wait until we’re nigh to San Angelo.’

  The Mexican bandit was one thing, a crooked sheriff something else again; Rick O’Shea resolved at that moment that whatever else befell him, he would see Seth Jackson in his grave before this affair was ended. In the meantime, his wrists were lashed behind his back with a rawhide thong and he was taken to a small shed that was used to store tack for the horses. There he was left to reflect upon his fate.

  It was not the first tight spot that O’Shea had been in in his life and he had no reason at all to believe that it would be the last. Yanez, for all his cunning, could not help boasting about how clever he was being and that had given his captive something of an edge. The knowledge that those devils meant to kill him out of hand meant that O’Shea had absolutely nothing to lose.

  He didn’t doubt his ability to break free of his present predicament; the only debatable point was whether or not he would be able to do so and live for more than a minute or two afterwards. In other circumstances he might perhaps have bided his time and waited for something to present itself, but if he was going to be killed in any case – well then, there was no use sitting and waiting for the end to come.